CHAPTER 7
Fiona
I had been the one to tell Eli that things needed to stay strictly professional between us, and as the days passed, controlling my less-than-professional thoughts about him had started to feel like one of the hardest things I’d ever done in my life. Every time I saw those muscular arms and luscious lips of his, I wanted to feel them all over my body again.
Occasionally, I would catch the way he looked at me, and hoped he felt the same as I did. But whenever I thought I saw a meaningful look in his eyes when he gazed at me, he’d abruptly turn away, leaving me wondering if I had imagined the whole thing.
It was unsettling how he had changed so drastically after his flirtations with me in the library that day my father had delivered the news he’d be working for us. He had wasted no time in reminding me of that passionate night we’d spent together in Turkey, and had seemed to have all the confidence in the world about us reliving that night. Now, however, it sometimes seemed like he didn’t remember that night at all. His indifference toward me made me wonder if something had happened to change the way he felt about me.
Had seeing me in an everyday setting turned him off? Made him no longer think of me as attractive? Had he been fooled by my tight dress and makeup in Turkey, only to find out that the beautiful sexy woman he had encountered back then had only been an illusion?
Had he just been drunk when I first met him? Or overtaken by his bear? I’d heard of that before, but Eli was the first shifter I had been with. I still wondered why he didn’t bite me or scratch me that night. Or if those were just stories girls told.
It drove me crazy trying to figure out why Eli no longer seemed remotely attracted to me. Not to mention, it was giving my self-esteem quite a beating.
My dating history wasn’t extensive, but I always contributed that to the fact that my life was so busy. Plus, so much of my time was spent with my father that there just wasn’t much room left for dating. The way Eli was treating me though, now made me wonder if I just wasn’t all that appealing to men. While I had been blaming my busy schedule for my lack of a love-life, I now worried that it was really because I couldn’t hold anyone’s interest for a significant amount of time.
I found myself growing more and more nervous each time Eli was around—my heart breaking a little more each time he seemed to consciously avoid getting too close to me.
I wanted to ask him flat out if there was a problem, but I just couldn’t work up the nerve. Maybe it was the fact I was human? I wasn’t sure. So I stayed quiet in my agony, growing more and more depressed along the way.
I tried to tell myself that maybe it was a good thing that Eli no longer wanted me, because it gave me more time to study and keep my mind on-track. But it was useless. I was falling for Eli more and more each time I saw him—attracted to more than just his looks. It was his mannerisms, his quiet-strength, the respect and admiration he showed toward my father…
All the while, he just continued to look past me, as if I was merely a job he had landed but didn’t honestly want any more.
I was just the means of keeping food on his table.
* * *
There was a tentative knock on my bedroom door and I didn’t need to be psychic to know it was Eli.
Dad had gone out for the day to a meeting which he insisted would be brief and therefore he wouldn’t need me to accompany him.
“You can stay here, darling,” he had said. “I know I’ve been asking so much from you lately, but you have your own stuff going on. Stay in and study, and then get some rest. I’ll be back before you know it. I’ll tell Eli to stick around the house just in case you need to go somewhere.”
I knew Eli wasn’t there just to escort me though. He practically camped out at our house every day, especially on days when I was home alone. He had become the eternal look-out, making sure there was no suspicious activity happening anywhere near our home.
“Yeah?” I said glancing to my closed bedroom door.
“Just letting you know I’m ready whenever you are,” Eli’s voice sounded through the door.
I sighed, pulling on my sports bra and then reaching for my yoga shorts. Although I should have been studying, I had decided to go out to a yoga class instead, figuring it would refresh my mind so that when I got back home, I would have better focus for studying.
“Be there in a second,” I said, my tone lackluster. I already felt annoyed, thinking about the expressionless gaze Eli always kept on his face whenever he was with me.
I supposed yoga would help distract me from him as well.
I stood in the mirror and reached for a comb, detangling my hair before pulling it up into a high ponytail.
Suddenly, it occurred to me that I no longer wanted to go out to a yoga class.
I looked toward my door, practically sensing Eli’s presence on the other side. Visions of that night in Turkey began to replay in my head, making me quiver at the memory of his skin on mine.
My imagination spinning into overdrive, I began envisioning recreating the night, right here and right now, in my bed while we had the entire house to ourselves…
Indecent thoughts prancing through my mind, I slowly approached the door. There was a certain level of shame underlying what I was about to do, but I couldn’t stop myself. I needed to know once and for all whether Eli still felt the slightest bit of attraction toward me, or if it had all been a meaningless drunken fling that he wished to forget.
When I opened the door, just as I expected, he stood outside. He was leaning against the wall with his arms folded. “You ready?” he asked, turning his back already and heading down the hall. When he realized I wasn’t following behind him, he stopped and turned around.
God, he looked good today. He wore a black sleeveless tank, showing off his muscular forearms and tattoos, with a pair of jeans and combat boots. No suit when my Dad wasn’t around. Interesting.
I was so busy looking at him that it took me a moment to realize his eyes had widened upon seeing me. I stood perfectly still as his eyes left my face and traveled down to my chest, my exposed abdomen, and the tiny yoga shorts I wore. Seeing that my feet were still bare, he raised an eyebrow and then let his eyes travel back up to my face. “Uhm…don’t you need some shoes or something? I thought you were going out to your, uhh…” His voice trailed off, as he got distracted by my body again.
My heart hammered in my chest, an uncontrollable pleasure coming over me at the fact that finally—I had caught his attention.
“I think I’m going to stay in,” I said, opening my bedroom door wider. “I’m not sure I feel like being bothered with going out today. I can do my yoga right here, and then head downstairs to get some studying done.”
Eli nodded. “All right. Well, I’ll be downstairs. Call me if you need anything.”
My breath hitched in my throat. His leaving me hadn’t been part of the plan. I wanted him to stay. “Wait!” I said, thinking fast.
He turned back around, his eyebrows raised. “Yeah?”
“I, uhm…need my yoga mat.”
“Okay…”
“It’s downstairs. Can you bring it up for me?”
“Downstairs where?”
“In the exercise room.”
“Well, why don’t you just do your yoga in the exercise room then?”
“I…Because, I—” I sputtered, trying to answer the question quickly, but failing to come up with a logical explanation.
Eli shook his head and sighed. “Never mind. Be right back.”
As I watched him retreat down the hall and then down the staircase, I wanted to kick myself. I hated how desperate Eli made me feel, not to mention act. No wonder he had lost interest in me.
Yet, there was a ridiculous streak in me that just didn’t want to give up so easily. The way he’d stared at me in my yoga outfit was proof that he still found me visually appealing to some degree. It wasn’t much, but I was more than willing to work with that.
Using his absence as an opportunity to clean my room, I tossed dirty clothes out view, smoothed out the comforter on my bed, and then opened the blinds, permitting sunlight to stream through the windows.
When I heard him coming back up the stairs, I hastily sat down on the edge of my bed and began picking with my fingernails, not wanting him to know that I had just cleaned my room in record-breaking speed.
“Where do you want me to put this?” he asked, stopping in my doorway with the mat balanced on his shoulder.
“Just put it right there,” I said, pointing to the spot in front of my bed and trying my best to sound nonchalant. Once he set down the yoga mat, I stood up and stretched. His eyes roamed my body yet again.
Goodness, Fiona—you’re acting like such a slut, a voice in my head chastised. But I ignored the voice.
“Have you ever tried yoga?” I asked as I approached the mat. I kept my eyes glued to him, determined to engage him in conversation so that he wouldn’t try to leave again.
He shook his head. “No. Not my thing. Bears don’t really stretch out, ya know?”
I began to stretch on the mat. “Really? What is your thing then?”
“I’m more into cardio, weight-lifting. That sort of thing. I like running through the woods.”
“In your bear form?” I asked, intrigued.
“Yeah, gotta break outta my shell every once in a while, or he goes nuts.”
“Yoga is really relaxing. You should give it a try sometime. It’s really easy too. See look—this is a basic yoga stretch.” I demonstrated for him, once again pleased to see his eyes roaming my body.
“Are you trying to get me to do yoga with you, Fiona?” he asked, folding his arms across his chest.
I gave him a sly grin. “Is it working?”
He laughed, the sound of it being music to my ears. It seemed like such a long time since I’d heard him laugh—or even seen him smile—at least in my direction. “No,” he said.
I pouted. “Well, will you at least keep me company?”
Eli’s brow furrowed. “It gets lonely being the Speaker’s daughter, huh? I’d imagine it’s hard to know who to trust.”
I swallowed, having not anticipated the conversation taking such a serious turn. I lowered my gaze to the floor, this time genuinely focusing on my stretches rather than on him. “No. Being the Speaker’s daughter is all right. It’s lonely being the only child of a widowed potential vice-presidential candidate.”
“You guys don’t have much family, huh?”
I shook my head. “I’m an only child. My mom was an only child. And my dad is an only child.”
“Wow.” Eli ran a hand through his silky dark hair.
“You don’t have to stand there. You can take a seat if you want,” I said, pointing to the chair across the room. It was a comfortable reclining chair that I had been stingy about since childhood, never letting anyone else sit in it. It was where I liked to curl up with a good book and read late into the night whenever I had trouble sleeping. Yet, for some reason, I didn’t mind Eli sitting there.
He crossed the room, removed the pillows from the sides of the chair, and took a seat. With a sigh, he leaned back and closed his eyes for a second.
“Long day?”
“Taking care of you is a lot of work. I mean—looking after you, rather.”
“I’m sorry,” I said, feeling as if I had literally been stung.
Eli smiled. “Don’t worry. I wouldn’t change it for anything in the world.”
I blinked, startled by the sincerity in his voice. I also noted that his face looked slightly flushed, as if he had said more than he meant to. An involuntary smile spread across my lips, and Eli averted his gaze just for an instant as I went into another yoga stretch.
After a while though, he couldn’t keep his eyes off me. I glanced at him throughout my workout, seeing lust creeping into his eyes each time I twisted my body into an interesting position. Purposely contorting myself into erotic poses, I finished my workout feeling just as hot and bothered as Eli looked. I suppressed a smile when he reached for one of the pillows he’d removed from the chair and placed it in his lap.
He abruptly cleared his throat. “Uhm…excuse me,” he said, standing awkwardly from the chair and making a rather obvious effort to not face me as he returned the pillow.
The he bolted from the room.
I had a feeling I wouldn’t see him up close for the rest of the day, which left me feeling a bit disappointed. But thinking of the way he watched me put a smile on my face. I flipped over on my yoga mat and just lied there for a while, my body yearning for him and wishing so desperately that he had taken the bait.